Our guest, E.J. Glaser, is the father of Nikki and Lauren Glaser. Nikki is a highly accomplished comedian, whose stand-up career as led to appearances on all the major late-night shows including Fallon, Kimmel, Conan, Seth Myers.
Nikki has been on two seasons of Last Comic Standing, Dancing with the Stars, hosted her own TV shows on MTV, and is currently the host of Blind Date on Bravo TV. She has appeared in several Netflix specials and has participated in the roasts of some of the biggest names in entertainment, including: Alec Baldwin, Rob Lowe, & Bruce Willis.
In addition to all of that, Nikki also hosts her own highly rated hit podcast, called “You Up, with Nikki Glaser”.
Nikki and her sister Lauren are both fortunate to have EJ Glaser as their father. In this episode, EJ and I discuss a wide variety of topics, including: work-life balance, “Action Saturdays”, and what not to say to your adolescent daughter.
We also touch on the topic of eating disorders in the episode. If you or someone you know is struggling with an eating disorder, a great place to learn more and get help is the National Eating Disorder Association (NEDA). www.nationaleatingdisorders.org
Book referenced by E.J.: On Becoming a Person, by Carl R. Rogers
You can find Nikki on:
Her website: https://nikkiglaser.com/
Instagram & Twitter: @NikkiGlaser
Glaser Family, Christmas 2018. From left to right: E.J., Nikki, Julie, & Lauren
Glaser family when the girls were teens
Nikki and E.J. performing together in 2020
Please forgive the errors in the transcript! Enjoy the episode!
Jonathan V.: Well, I would really love to start by trying to understand what the Glaser household was like when the kids were young and what that dynamic look like. But before we go there, I got to know what it’s been like for you over these past few days – touring with your daughter and playing guitar with her on stage in front of these crowds. What’s that been like?
E.J. Glaser: It’s been the dream of a lifetime. I tell you, you know, I was an aspiring musician in my twenties and I just, I didn’t have the confidence that my daughter has about trying to pursue a career in entertainment. So when I was in my late twenties, I thought, well, you know, I’ve got to go get a real job. I can’t just play music for a living
But I played music for a living for about three years. And I enjoyed myself immensely, but then started a career in cable television. So yeah, being on the road with Nikki…In my last 10 years, I’ve had a band in St. Louis and I’ve played a lot of gigs around town and kind of gotten back into it. And, I semi-retired and sort of pursuing music more full time. And I play in retirement homes and I play gigs by myself, and I have a trio,
Jonathan V.: I think that’s Glaze and the Moon Kings,
E.J. Glaser: Right. That’s right. Yeah. We have a guy named Dave Moon, the guy named Jim King and EJ Glaser. So we all get equal billing. And, I’m the head of the band.
But yeah, playing with Nikki, it was just a blast, you know, playing in front of a thousand people at a drive-in (movie theater) and walking on stage. And, because of Nikki’s Instagram, all her fans on Instagram, she’s showed me live on there a few times playing in clubs and things. So her fans have some idea of what I do and there’s some awareness out there.
So that was, that was fun. I even had, when we were in Cape Cod at a drive-in, a group of girls in the front row had “EJ” signs.
Jonathan V.: That’s great.
E.J. Glaser: So it gave me a taste of what it’s like to be a real rock star for all. And Nikki came on stage at the end and she said, yeah, this is my dad’s Make-A-Wish. I said, don’t tell me I have a terminal illness that nobody’s told me about. So that was fun banter.
Jonathan V.: How would you describe the difference between playing on a stage at a drive and in front of a thousand people or more in versus a, the bar band experience?
E.J. Glaser: You know, I kind of dealt felt the same way about it. It was fun to move around more and just be a little more animated because it’s such a gigantic crowd.
Jonathan V.: And I’m sure a big highlight must have been doing that with your daughter.
E.J. Glaser: Oh my God. It was just so much fun. It was. She really threw me a bone taking me out there. I really feel flattered as she did. And it was just a chance of a lifetime.
Jonathan V.: I can’t imagine.
E.J. Glaser: You know, I walked on stage at the drive-in and one of my lines I came up with, I said, you know, I haven’t been to a drive in since the night Nikki was conceived. So, we had fun with it.
Jonathan V.: That’s terrific. Well, I didn’t have the opportunity to see those shows, but did enjoy your performance as the house band, you and your wife, on the Jimmy Kimmel show.
E.J. Glaser: Once again, that was an opportunity of a lifetime as well. We only got to do 5 or 10 seconds, but, it was a blast. It was really fun.
Jonathan V.: It looked like fun. That was really endearing as well. And you guys sounded great too. I was impressed.
Rolling back the clock, what was the Glaser household like when your daughters – I think your other one’s name is Lauren, correct? Right. When your daughter’s were young?
E.J. Glaser: Well, it was just like, anybody who’s a parent out there knows it was crazy times for a while there, when you have two kids within 18 months of each other, Trying to work hard and make a living and support the family and everything. So, but Julie was, we opted to decide, you know, Julie was a stay at home mother and she gave up her job.
In fact, soon as she got pregnant, she became pregnant in about two months she said, okay, I’m finished with my job. She took advantage of it as quickly as she could, but that was our decision because we thought it would be important for Julie to be at home with the kids.
And I was working in cable. I worked for Warner communications in those days. I was a Director of sales there and we had 125 salespeople. They went door to door and I was in charge of doing all the, the marketing and advertising and so forth. And so I was working 12 hour days and just, you know, early days of cable television were just completely crazy.
But, we had a house that we lived on, on a whitewater river, outside of Cincinnati, in an area called Loveland. And it was 10 minutes away from work. So I was able to get home and take care of things if need be. But, the kids were just a blast to have around. And my wife comes from a family of 10 kids. And most of them were in Cincinnati and her mother and father were there and my mom was still alive there. So we had a lot of support in Cincinnati. July was able to go to her mom’s house and we could bring the kids over there for a night or two and get some breasts.
Just to give you a little overview, I had a boss that I just didn’t like at all, and I really struggled with it for a year. And I just decided to take a chance and joined my brother and this independent contractor business selling advertising.
So I decided to do that. I thought I’d have more time with the kids, like a tired of 12 hour days and working on weekends and everything. And so I thought, you know, this will give me a chance to work on my house. So I quit my job. But I was just carefully cavalier about it and thought, you know, I could make good money. I’ll build this business up. And after about two months, I quickly realized, oh no, I’m good at this, I’m doing well, but I’m not going to make the kind of money I was used to making.
Jonathan V.: And how, how were the hours?
E.J. Glaser: The hours were great. I was able to spend more time with the kids, but I was running appointments and trying to build a business selling advertising in these Thomas Regional Directories, these business directories. Which, you know, going from the world of cable, where I had HBO and all these networks, wining and dining me of everything and going from that to being a struggling salesman, it’s a good thing to spend more time with the kids, but it was a big mistake as far as our financial opportunity.
After two years, I thought I have to find a different gig. And my experience was all on cable television. For some reason, everybody was kind of, I don’t know, if you didn’t have experience in that field, they probably didn’t want to look at you. So I struggled finding a new gig to come into a position that was a middle management type position.
So I thought, well, I’m going to call a head hunter and maybe we’ll have to move. So I, it, a head hunter and within a week I had three interviews. I went to Minneapolis, I flew to Denver, and I flew to St. Louis and I was offered a job in St. Louis. And I accepted that. And within a month we were moving to St. Louis. So Nikki was six years old. She was in first grade and Lauren was just in preschool.
Jonathan V.: Pretty good ages. Was that still a difficult transition for them? Did you have to help them to manage through that change?
E.J. Glaser: Not one bit. They were just totally malleable in those days, you know. Nikki and I were talking about it. She went from one first grade class, halfway through the year, to another first grade. I was looking at her baby book and some notes that I had written just last week. We were looking at it on her podcast and…
Jonathan V.: I listened to that. Yeah, that was great.
E.J. Glaser: Yeah, her first week she was going ice skating on that Saturday and spending that at a friend’s house that night, she, she just transitioned very smoothly as did Lauren Lauren was in preschool and she loved her new preschool and had friends and right away. And so it worked out well.
That’s wonderful, but I felt so horrible taking them away from their grandparents and all the support system we had in Cincinnati. But I told my wife, you know, My wife never went away to college. And I said “Hey, we’ll give it four years. It’ll be like going away to college. We’ll come back and it’ll be fun.” And, here we are here we are 30 years later, still in St. Louis.
Jonathan V.: Can I ask how you approach that (work/life balance)? I think a lot of fathers struggle with that, right? I know I did. For many years, I’m actually in a part-time position now I took a 40% haircut on my pay and, I work three days a week officially.
It can be really difficult to figure out how to manage your work in a manner that enables you to be successful. Or, you make a trade-off in terms of your advancement at work. How did you go about being more purposeful in terms of managing your jobs so that it would not completely overtake your life?
E.J. Glaser: You know, I remember reading an article – Ronald Reagan was criticized in those days in the eighties for only working nine to five, he made a comment – because everybody said, you know, if you’re a president, you should work more hours than that – he made a comment that if you can’t get your work done from nine to five, then you’re doing something wrong.
So, just really trying to be effective while you’re there. Put in everything you can. And, I think the culture changed a little bit. The culture I was in, in Cincinnati when I was with Warner was, you know, if you left before eight o’clock, you are just considered not really doing your part.
So it was really just baby boomers trying to move up in the organization and trying to prove that you’re part of the team and they all work a 12 hour day. And yeah, I’ll work Saturdays too. And it was just, it was maniacal. It was crazy.
And then when I moved to St. Louis, I started, I was a Director of Marketing. I became vice president of marketing with Charter Communications, and I started hiring Generation X people. And then later in my career, Millennials. And the Gen X people I hired taught me a real lesson because their work ethic just wasn’t…I remember we used to lament about it as older baby boomer generation management – we’d say, “God, these, these Gen Xers boy, they don’t know how to work” They come in at 9:30 and they leave by 5:00. And, I took a lesson from that. It’s like, wow, they’re on to something. You know, the age-old adage that, you know, on your death bed, you’re not going to regret spending more time in the office.
Jonathan V.: So you took a lesson from the Gen Xers.
E.J. Glaser: I actually did. Yeah. I started to wake up and realize, you know, what, why am I giving all this time to this company when I could be home with my family? So I worked a solid workday and then went from there.
Jonathan V.: So it sounds like a couple of different adjustments, a bit was a mindset in terms of what you thought was reasonable to invest in your career from a time perspective. And then how you invested that time – sounds like you worked to become more efficient and effective within that allotted time.
Thinking back to your home life, did you and your wife have discreet parenting responsibilities?
E.J. Glaser: You know, my, my wife, we used to talk about it. My, my wife’s family, they had 10 kids and that was the World War II generation.
And her father was a great guy. Great, man. He didn’t brag about it. I think his wife brought this up more than anything. He never changed one diaper. Wow. And anybody, my age group down just always has that reaction. Cause you know, I pitched them when I was there. You know, I’d wake up and bowl the night.
If they weren’t being breastfed, I’d give him a bottle and do what I could and change diapers. You know, my generation, we pushed in and we were there when the kids were born, we weren’t sitting in the waiting room. We were, we were there to snip the umbilical cord and experience everything just really, but really, you know, when I came home from work.
It was like, leave it to Beaver. You know, Julie had my wife had a meal on the table and she pretty much taken care of the kids needs and so forth. But when I came home, I spent time with them until we put the kids to bed. But really she did have the lion’s share of the work. She did all the laundry and the house cleaning and stuff and I was the one that was the breadwinner.
Jonathan V.: In terms of parenting philosophies. Are there any that come to mind in terms of how you approached parenting values that you tried to instill?
E.J. Glaser: You know, I look back on my parenting and, you know, I, I just was really trying to just be myself and just think that the kids were gonna learn a lot of life lessons just by, by me being me and doing my thing.
And I, you know, I looked back at this one. Regret I have is not giving them more sit down and say, you could do. Is there anything in life here’s some principles to live by? I never really took that approach. I just really try to set a good example and, you know, be a fun father and take the kids on outings and try to instruct them and read to them and steer them towards the right type of media or the right type of books and things like that.
I hear a lot of people talking about their parents and say, my parent, my father always told me to treat people with respect and to be blind. I just never really had those kind of definitive lessons. So I think, you know, I wish I would have done more of that, but I think in so many words, I think I did instill those kind of values I want to do and still, but I didn’t define it as stuff.
Jonathan V.: I think those are good to articulate those things to your child if they come from a place of sincerity, but only if it’s backed up with the example. And, I don’t think it does any good at all if the parent is saying “treat people with respect” and then they don’t. So if you were modeling that, that can be much more powerful than saying it, and certainly much better than saying it not living up to it.
E.J. Glaser: That makes me feel a little better. You know, I came from, I came from a home where my father was an eye surgeon. And my mom was a stay at home mom and my father ended up being an alcoholic and really screwing up in a major way. He had an affair with another woman and when I was like seven years old and treated my mom horribly.
And so they went through a terrible divorce. I was raised well by my mother and my father married another woman. And my father passed away. When I was like 11 years old and cut us out of the will entirely. And so people always think when you were raised by, you know, your father wasn’t raised wealthy and we didn’t really have thoughts of like grandma helped us out, but my mom was at work and we lived fine.
I mean, we had a great life, but my mom really rose to the occasion. She was a great mother and we all kind of bonded. We had my older brother and older sister, we all bonded as a family unit, really supported my mom. And we knew we were, it was kind of us against the world because. There was a real stigma to divorce in those days.
I was, you know, I wasn’t allowed to play with a lot of kids in my in my grade because I was in a Catholic school and I came from a divorced household and my father was a little bit violent sometimes. And so I remember playing football and somebody across the street from a friend of mine’s house and his mom came home with groceries and I had to go hide in the bushes while she unloaded the groceries. So she wouldn’t see me there.
Jonathan V.: My goodness.
E.J. Glaser: I always say, I don’t know. I always knew that I was being raised the right way and I always knew that it was ridiculous. We had a stigma attached to us, so I don’t know, I just kind of rose above it. Are
Jonathan V.: Were there things from that experience that, you think purposefully or otherwise applied in your parenting? Are there things that perhaps you were purposeful to avoid based on your father’s example and how you were describing your father, or things that you adopted from your mom’s example?
E.J. Glaser: My mom always, we always used humor to get through hard times. And my mom had a good sense of humor. And occasionally my mom raised three kids. You know, we have carpools that come by to pick, pick us up for school. And my mom would oversleep. She would come running in our bedroom to go, I overslept and we’d have three minutes to get ready and.
And then occasionally she would just like wave the carpools on and say, we’re having a Glaze Day. We all say we’re all sick today and we’d stay home. And we would just have a fun time watching TV and playing, playing cards, doing whatever we did. So I always thought, you know, just having humor and just trying to be lighthearted about things in my life.
And I made a pledge even before we took her vows. I said – hey, if we do this and we get married then we’re not getting divorced, ’cause I’m not going to have that happen to my kids. We had that commitment on our own. We’re going to make this thing work regardless.
Jonathan V.: That’s wonderful. Would I be inferring too much by thinking that might’ve been some of the, the early seeds of Nikki’s personality in terms of her interest in comedy?
E.J. Glaser: I’d like to think so. We always we’re immersed in media. I mean, the kids from early time, we would like my, my parent, my mom would always watch when Don Rickles was on Johnny Carson.
Back in the sixties, we would stay up late. She let us stay up late to watch Don Rickles. Cause we were fans of buddy Hackett, any of these old comedians. And so we were, we were kind of steeped in comedy and my daughter, Lauren is very funny too, but we’ve always used numerous a way to get through tough situations.
And it’s always been something that my wife’s family – great bunch of funny people that might father-in-law. My mother in law was just off the charts with humor. It’s always been a way to get us through, but I’d say yeah, humor was a big part of our life.
Jonathan V.: Would you purposely expose, would you expose your daughters to some of the comedians to the late night shows?
E.J. Glaser: Friends was a big show and when my kids were young and I used to let them watch that, but they were too young to be watching it, I guess it was the nineties.
So Nikki would have been 10 years old and, you know, all the innuendo in that show, not even any window, just full frontal. And I used to call it Nikki. Remembered this the other day, but I used to call it, you know, the show was called Friends. I used to call it sexual frenzy because everybody was, was dealing with everybody else.
My wife and I would watch that and said, Oh my God, thank God most of this is going over their heads, but of course, a lot of it didn’t and then Seinfeld came around and Seinfeld was pretty much raw too. But by that time they were a little bit over, but we would never miss a Seinfeld and all that.
The kids watched Friends, so we didn’t watch tons of television, but I guess, you know, we steered them towards, you know, they found on their own. Nikki said every day after school, she would watch Saved by the Bell. I never saw that show ever. She was on a podcast with one of the stars from that show recently. And she was, she was so excited about it. But the other thing, you know, because of my cable career, I had one of the first TeeVoes (television recording device) and that changed everything because Nikki was able to watch Conan O’Brien and that is what she attributes to her comedy career. She’s been on Conan a few times and whenever she’s on, she always tells Conana “You are the reason I’m here.”
Jonathan V.: That’s terrific. On the parenting spectrum. There is the humor to get you through some of those harder times or just to keep things light and have fun. On the other side, when you had to implement discipline, how did you approach that?
E.J. Glaser: We were really pretty loosey-goosey on that.
When I was raised by my mother, you know, I was third kid and she just trusted me to be on that. Most of my friends had a good day to be home by 11 o’clock or something in high school. And, you know, I, I could stay out as long as I wanted to. And I, I really didn’t abuse it much. I just, I hate to act like I was just upstanding great guy or anything, but I, I just, you know, my mom trusted me and I agreed with that trust.
But so our kids, we kind of did the same thing, but they have the curfews, so it’d be able to it to be home at a certain time. And they were both such good girls, Nikki. He used to just. Panic. If, if she was, you know, going to be late for a project or she was in the national honor society and she mostly had straight A’s and Lauren was the same way.
They’re great students and they really didn’t get in any trouble. I mean, I remember telling Mickey one time in high school, I said, you know, before you leave high school, Try to get some kind of detention.
If it’s just, they’re going, gonna look back and think he didn’t have any fun, they were really good students and, you know, involved in extracurriculars and think he was in a bunch of plays.
Lauren was in plays too. They were both so focused and really just great, great kids. You know, I used to, I used to love to go to parent teacher conferences because I would just pass in all these beautiful comments. They would tell me about my kids. And I would never miss parent teacher conference because I just love getting that positive feedback.
Jonathan V.: That’s terrific. Yeah. I’ve not heard many parents advise their kids to try to get in some more.
E.J. Glaser: (laughter) Ya’ know, like John Lewis said “Good trouble”
Jonathan V.: You’d brought up something earlier. I wanted to just explore a little bit further. And see, you mentioned, you tried to parent by example, in some ways, are, are there particular things that you exemplified that you think were important for raising your daughters, certain things that you were modeling or certain values that you had that perhaps translated into learnings for your daughters as they observed you?
E.J. Glaser: I guess. Unconditional love, just whatever you’re going to do. We’re going to live. And that’s a wonderful thing for kids to know that they have. And not just saying you love them all the time, but just, just showing it and just, you know, hugging ’em and. Trying to when they were young and trying to play with them and be at their level and try to listen to them and looking back, you know, every parent always thinks, wow, I could have done so much better.
I could have done so much more. You always beat yourself up sometimes for that. But not that I was the greatest, but when I, when I was on the weekends, we always, we used to call them Action Saturdays, you know, I’d always. We’d always have a bunch of things playing on a Saturday, you know, and try and go out and experience things and spend as much time with the kids as possible.
People always tell you boy, enjoy these days while you can, because they go fast. And boy, I took that to heart cause they do go fast. Cause once she wants the girls got to be 12, 13 years old, they care less about spending time with their parents. Sure. You’ve heard that the classic line with girls, especially the aliens come and take them away when they were 15.
And then they bring them back though, when they’re in their early twenties was so true. That’s very fitting. I never forget it. Drive it Nicky around. You got to go pick up her friends to go to the mall or the movie, wherever they were going. And, upon approaching one of her friend’s houses, she said, dad, When my friends get in the car, don’t try to be funny.
Like, you know, I never am funny. I’m just trying to be funny.
Jonathan V.: That’s such a loaded statement.
E.J. Glaser: You’ve never “been’” funny,
Jonathan V.: that is great. Do you recall any particular, challenges that you had to deal with?
E.J. Glaser: Well, Nikki had an eating disorder it’s really that, that was the hardest time being a parent that I can remember. And Nikki will talk about, we didn’t do a very good job at it. And, I think it’s one of those things it’s so difficult to understand.
You know, she went on a crash diet and senior year, and I remember we went to Florida for spring break and we drove down with a few of their friends in the car. We drove down to this area and a lot of st Louis let’s go to Destin, Florida all the way down. And our, we stopped and get fast food or whatever we did.
Nikki wouldn’t get anything to eat and she would maybe eat one French fry or something. And it’s like, what are you doing? And that’s when it really started, I guess. As senior year progressed, sort of, she was really skinny. And some of the teachers sort of telling my wife that, you know, there’s a problem here.
So we ended up having to take her to, to see doctors and. He had to come and intervene and know if we had to put her in a hospital for a few days. And she was really against that night. I was kind of like, Hey, this, if you’re not going to eat, then this is what you’re going to have to, you’re going to have to deal with this.
You know, this is, this is what happens to you. You can’t take care of yourself or for somebody to take care of it. And Nikki will, I’m talking to her as podcast and she’s told us too, that we just kind of really. We’re not aware of it what’s happening and really should have maybe intervened earlier. And it was just such a puzzling thing.
And I remember talking to my cousin, who’s a doctor at the time I called him up. He knew something about this. These things we’ll probably deal with the rest of your life. Once you have an eating disorder or something really affects you forever. She came into her own and kind of, we kind of worked it out and really overcame it and, you know, started looking more healthy and started doing better.
But boy, that was really, that was a scary, scary time for us because we just couldn’t understand it at all.
Jonathan V.: I can’t imagine they don’t have any daughters. So I’m talking from a place of where I don’t have that experience, but it strikes me as though it’s harder for them, for girls and young women to, to deal with the pressures and body image and things.
E.J. Glaser: Nikki. Make sure she did everything perfect with her grades and studying and doing papers. She’d stay up all night to make sure the paper was perfect. And she was going to get the right grade on it. That’s why I told her, relax, just get it, get a detention every once in a while. You can’t be perfect all the time.
So that was, I remember reading that thinking. Wow. They really hit the nail on the head with Nikki because she’d go on a diet. I guess the analogy was you go on a diet and you find out. Wow, I’m good at this, you know, I’m good at not eating. And so you overachieve in that department too.
Jonathan V.: I would imagine these days with social media, the perception of what “perfect” is, with touched up photos and people only displaying certain photos, that there’s a skewed perception of what a healthy, perfect body looks like.
E.J. Glaser: Yeah, I think you’re so right. I remember watching an older movie with, with either of my daughters, even recently, they say, wow, look at that. And this stuff, and these girls were so much, so much heavier and you know, to me, they look totally attractive, but to them, they look like, wow, they’re overweight.
Jonathan V.: So with the benefit of hindsight and from what Nikki has told you are there signs that. So if there’s another parent listening right now, who, who has a daughter that they suspect this might be a problem, or are there signs that you would advise people look for in order to detect it earlier? Is there an approach that you would recommend to do differently than perhaps that you did in terms of handling?
E.J. Glaser: I would say, if you have a daughter that goes on a diet and all they talk about is food and they start looking at calories, but I would say you have a, the beginnings of a problem. If not, the problem’s already there. And I think I was, we were in denial. We just didn’t want to. And you know, that, that happens to other people.
Could it be happening to our daughter? And I guess it happens so gradually to see them go from a normal body to thinner and thinner and fender didn’t, didn’t really slap us in the face until other people brought it to our attention. Alright.
Jonathan V.: Yeah. Yeah. As many of them are, I think we all, we all have our demons and challenges and that’s one that certainly plagues a lot of people. I think, I think you’re right. That we all believe it won’t happen to our child. I’m sure it happens to boys as well, certainly with a lower prevalence. I only know this because there was a 5K in my area as a fundraiser for it, but there is a terrific organization called NEDA.
It’s the National Eating Disorders Association. So if there are people listening that suspect that their child might have a similar eating disorder, then that’s a great resource to check out first and to learn more about it.
E.J. Glaser: Yeah. I think it’s like most of those kinds of groups just really raising awareness about it is half the battle, because if I would have been more aware of it, we might’ve might’ve discovered it earlier, but I was really asleep at the wheel on that one.
I didn’t know much about it. Yeah,
Jonathan V.: It’s brave of Nikki to talk about it. And I appreciate your talking about it as well, because it helps so many people when people talk about it, especially people that are well known, it helps people to understand that it’s, it’s much more common and prevalent than one might think.
Just to touch on a, maybe a related topic. Nikki’s talked about depression from time to time as well. I’m a little less familiar with her history with it. Is that something that manifests or was something that your family worked through when she was a child or was that later?
E.J. Glaser: Yeah, depression can run in families. You know, those kinds of problems. And we were just talking about it the other day while we were on our little comedy tour. So I know it runs in my family. It’s something that, my daughter Lauren doesn’t struggle with, but Nicki, Nikki has struggled with it. And if you know more about comedians, a lot of them seem to have depressive qualities, all have some dark, dark times.
He always talks about one of the highest compliments I ever gave her was years ago. You know, when she was first starting out in comedy, I said, wow, you’re, you know, cause I always listen to Howard Stern. I’m always amazed how honest he can be about him himself and suddenly. Here’s honest as Howard Stern.
I can’t believe she said that a few times. Like a great thing. I guess, as a family, we’ve had the first time she was on Jay Leno. Cause she was doing jokes about my wife and I. And I’ll never forget. They sent us out a packet of FedEx packet with all kinds of documents to sign saying we will not sue NBC or its affiliates.
And we just find them at a FedEx. And back that day, then we had to suffer the slings and arrows of her comedy. One of her jokes was. Yeah, my mom, she she’s a shopaholic. She loves to buy alcohol. And my wife said she couldn’t go to the grocery store and buy a bottle of vodka for months after that,
Jonathan V.: you mentioned that you were, you know, expressive in your personality or your humor around the house. My understanding is that Nikki’s first experience in standup comedy was at the age of 18. How did you see her progress towards that?
E.J. Glaser: Starting in middle school. She was in plays. She had the role of Scout in To Kill a Mockingbird and she nailed that one.
And then she, we had this, she had a drama teacher in middle school and when she went to high school, her drama teacher ended up going to, you know, making the leap from middle school to high school. So she had the same drama coach. It was really a great guy. So he put her in place and she was always, you know, everything from Macbeth to, she was in a play called longest the tea house moon, which is an old Marlon Brando.
It’s kind of a comedy. I remember her drama coach told her she had great comedic timing. He says, you’re like Lucille ball. If she took that to heart. I mean, because it was a funny part in that play. Yeah. It was just one of those things that a teacher telling you, one thing can make all the difference in your life.
So then she went to college freshman year at university, Colorado for roommates, all told her how funny she was and they had a talent show out there and they convinced her. To sign up to go to the talent show, to do some standup, which you had never done before. And her roommate. Catherine who was still her best friend.
They actually called me on a cell phone front row of the talent night. And I got to listen to Nikki’s first performance on stage. I didn’t really, I forget what she talked about, but I got to hear it live on over cell phone was so funny. She came home that summer and she. Wanting to go to a comedy club.
And so I took her up, she was under age 21 and over club, but I guess I got her in and she didn’t, she didn’t have a drink or whatever, but we went to the funny bone, which is where she just performed last week. It’s still around and that’s the have a little tent card on the table that said they’re doing comedy classes on Saturdays.
And so she called the number and signed up for the economy class and that she never looked back.
Jonathan V.: You mentioned her participating in a play in high school – I read, and not everything that you read on the internet is correct so this may or may not be true – but that she used to be petrified of public speaking.
E.J. Glaser: I think even having to give an oral report in class and, and that’s a fear that she. Addressed head on by auditioning for a part in a play in high school and perhaps the same, what he referenced. Was that something that was, that was on your radar screen as a parent? I’m sure there’s a lot of challenges that as parents, we’re not even aware our kids are going through it.
I don’t really remember that being an issue and something that she might’ve dealt with on her own. You know, I, I was that way too. I, I didn’t play music professionally until I was 23 because I, I always knew I could do it. And I. Played for friends and so forth, but I never had the guts until finally girlfriend broke up with me and I was just kind of a downward spiral for awhile.
When I thought I played guitar a lot. I just, one day I thought, God damn, I’m going to go audition at a club and try to get a gaze. I go on dishes. This girl said you got the gig. You’re great. And I was like, Okay, so we’ll give you six weeks to learn more. I’ll be back. Well, have you guys the same way Nikki dealt with it?
She just kind of finally came to the point where she could overcome her fears and, you know, she was on dancing with the stars. She said that that was, that was like, you know, walking a tight rope for her. She said, I’m not a good dancer. She’d do it. And, but she said, you know, I’m going to do this because it’s something I’m totally afraid of. I’m going to overcome my fear and just force myself to do it. So she just has that inner moxy, but I definitely didn’t have when I was her age.
My other daughter is same way. She, she was interested in the Spanish culture and she’s on after college, I’m moving to Spain and we don’t know where that came from.
She went to Spain by herself and moved to Sevilla and lived there with some other girls and then came back. And then she said, she just knew she wanted to be a Spanish teacher and learned the language, moved back to Madrid for a year to immerse herself. And now she’s a Spanish teacher in high school.
Jonathan V.: That’s terrific.
It seems that Nikki, I suspect, based on how you describe her, Lauren as well, has a personality and a mindset that’s seems like she’s very courageous. Seems like she’s got a very positive “I can do this” type of an attitude.
I’ve heard her say that there was a point in time where she decided that she was going to do comedy and she was going to stick with it until she’s 27.
E.J. Glaser: When she was a fledgling startup, she said, “dad, it’s going to take me eight years to get good at this. So don’t. Don’t expect anything right away.”
Jonathan V.: Is there something that you think may have contributed to that positive and courageous mindset that your, your daughters appeared to have?
E.J. Glaser: I’d like to say that my example, my wife’s example led them to that level of self confidence, but I really can’t put a finger on anything that we did that was…I think my wife and I were always just surprised where they got that, because I sure didn’t have it when I was younger and my wife doesn’t think she did either.
So I’m really, I’m glad that they both have that kind of self confidence and stick to them to make it happen.
Jonathan V.: I think it’s like, there’s always a lot of different influences on a child and then there’s a certain part that’s nurtured and a certain part that’s nature as well. And, it’s hard to know where one starts and one stops sometimes.
Were you performing at all when they were growing up or is that something that you put on hold after you had kids and then restarted after?
E.J. Glaser: There was a time when I struggling, when I quit my job, like my good job, I was doing the other thing, I wasn’t making enough money.
We were struggling financially. So my, my old musical partner and I got together one summer when the kids were probably five and four at that point. So I guess we got together one summer and had a gig that we played a couple of nights a week. And I remember my wife bringing the kids to see me. And I remember, you know, she dressed them up a little, little dresses and they came and sat outside of this restaurant while we were performing. And I remember they were both just awestruck, seeing their old man playing in front of a bunch of people.
And, they had seen me playing around the house. And they’d say, “Dad, not the guitar again!”
And, my kids will tell you, I always made sure I had a piano because if I wouldn’t have a piano in my house growing up, I would have been a pianist for sure. We never had any musical influences in my house at all. I begged my mom for a guitar, but anyway, I made sure to have piano took piano lessons.
Lauren was really good at it. Nikki, it didn’t take as much with her. She didn’t care that much. Whenever I try to do a family sing along, they would never do it. Now on this trip on tour with Nikki she’s like “You finally get to sing with your daughter.”
Jonathan V.: That’s great that they got to see you perform.
I would imagine, and who knows what, what experiences shaped children in what way, but based on how you described their reaction, I would imagine that (seeing you play guitar in front of an audience) may have had an impact in terms of broadening their perception of what they can do and achieve – seeing their father up there doing something that, to me to this day, is incredible. When I see anybody performing in any manner in a bar or at a drive in, or in a large auditori it’s a hard for me to get my head around how I could do something like that. But to see your father do that, I would imagine that would be something.
E.J. Glaser: Yeah, hopefully, hopefully it encouraged them a little bit.
Jonathan V.: A couple of questions on parenting as an adult, like after your kids become an adult, how have you approached that? You’re certainly in a unique situation now due to quarantine work, your daughter is living with you, but as she transitioned from high school into adulthood, how did you approach parenting?
How did your relationship evolves at that point?
E.J. Glaser: It’s really fun when you get here and the kids get your twenties. All of a sudden you can be so much more honest with them, you know, like. Telling them things about, you know, some of the mistakes I made and, being more, more forthcoming about, you know, me getting kicked out of high schools and some of the dumb things I did.
And I talked about that when they were in high school too, I guess I didn’t tell them some of a wild tales of some of the things that. My friends did or I did. And so was really fun too, to give them some babies life lessons. So, you know, when you come across certain characters in your life, you know, I always use the line, you know, a few bad company, it brings bad fortune.
So make sure you pick your friends carefully, because if you hang out with people that are not good people, it’s going to reflect on you and that’s trying to drive home through. Telling stories about my past and so forth. But I guess the fun thing about having adult kids is just being able to level with them and they can tell you some of the dumb things you did as a parent and, you know, and Nikki or Lauren will both bring up things I did or said as a parent.
I’m like, I can’t believe I said that to you. You know?
Jonathan V.: So I have to ask, is there one that comes to mind?
E.J. Glaser: Pretty pretty funny, but, I think myself for saying this. This is kind of a weird thing, but we were to do it day one night when Nikki first started developing.
And, you know, if I was a boy and my father said, wow, you’re getting muscles. I would be like, “thanks, Dad”, or I would think that was really cool.
I said “Wow, Nikki, you’re getting breasts”. We were talking about it about it just a few days ago and that was probably one of the dumbest things I could ever say as a parent. But she ran away from the table crying. And, I thought it was like a major compliment. I kicked myself for being so stupid. She ran away from the table crying.
And my wife said “How could you say that?” and I said that I thought that I was giving her a compliment. I thought that’s something a girl would want to hear. But, you know, Nikki later told me that girls don’t want to, you know, all of a sudden develop breasts and have guys looking at them. They really feel terrible about that when they first start to go through adolescents. But yeah, so, just dumb things you do as a parent. You know, you just look back on that.
Adolescence is a tough time for any parent to go through. It’s just, you start to realize that when you have the kids, everything you have, they’re embarrassed to be with you. They don’t want to be seen with you. And everything you say is, you know, it’s like the classic Mark Twain line. I’m sure you’ve heard that, “I can’t believe my father was so stupid when I was 18, and how he got to be so smart by the time I was 23”
Jonathan V.: No truer words.
There was one of the topic I wanted to circle back to you briefly was that Nicky’s set your expectations, that it was going to take eight years for her to get traction as a comic. How, or did you support or encourage her through that journey?
I can see where there would be parents on the opposite end that are saying, you know, you’re crazy. You should get a job. How did you approach it?
E.J. Glaser: Well, we, she was making a little bit of money here and there, but not much, but we really gave her a nice fail-safe where we were supporting her somewhat in those days.
She always talks about how she’d been there, done it without our support. And I don’t remember it being all that much, but, you know, I guess we did, we did cough up, ya’ know, in those days, so she could have, you have something to fall back on. I always tried to be even-Steven with both my kids. So we always tried to do the same thing for Lauren, but I think Nikki might’ve gotten more in the long run.
So she had a little safety net to fall into. And she always attributes, you know, us really helping her so much in her early career. She keeps started paying back now. Buying us big gifts and things, things like that because she’s been more successful. We always tell her, don’t worry about it, you know, that’s something parents do. But looking back, you know, if I’d had a safety net like that I might have taken more risks too, as a young kid, you know?
So it’s nice to have your parents be able to do that. But we didn’t say, “Hey, we’re going to cover you no matter what”. She had to, you know, take part-time jobs. She was a babysitter. She taught Koreans how talk English when she was in LA, and she took temp jobs, and she always had to work.
Jonathan V.: Did your daughters have jobs when they were in the house, when they were in high school?
E.J. Glaser: They were always working in a beauty salon or weird jobs. Nikki was a waitress at the pizza place, California kitchen. She made pizzas in a place called Emo’s, a St. Louis institution.
Lauren has some more jobs working at a beauty salons and taking care of people’s dogs. Making extra money on the side. Cause we never really, you know, gave them anything they wanted or anything. They had to earn their own keep.
Jonathan V.: I have a few quick closing questions. So first, what are three words that you think your kids or your wife might use to describe your parenting style?
E.J. Glaser: Hopefully fun, loving, and forgiving. Kids can mess up and I’m not going to hold a grudge or anything, or, you know. It’s something that, that’s something that happened in the past – let’s move on from there. I really, I’m having trouble thinking of an example of that, but I guess I didn’t have to use forgiveness all that much with my kids.
But that’s something that I remember with my mother as being a good attribute – you mess up and it was – just move on from there. Let’s not, let’s not dwell on that. Just make things better going forward.
Jonathan V.: Yeah. Sound advice. With the benefit of hindsight. Is there something that you might have done differently as a father?
E.J. Glaser: I think as I started off talking about, I wish I would have imparted more of life’s lessons.
You know, I wish I would’ve talked more openly about sex with my daughters, which I didn’t really do. I thought that was my wife’s job to do. And I thought, well, they’ll just get that. Like I did on my, my mom never really sat me down and told me all about that. And I wish I would have given them more advice on how boys think in high school. And, more of that kind of stuff.
I wish that would have given them more, instill more of, “Hey, you can do whatever you want to do.” And you know, you just have to work hard. And I suppose that would have been more like a “Famous Quotations” so to speak. I lead by example and try to give them the confidence that I thought it would just come through being a good father and being active, and being concerned, and being loving.
But to really just be more emphatic about communicating certain ideals.
Jonathan V.: Are there any books or resources or habits that you found helpful and to make you a better parent in general?
E.J. Glaser: I remember a book that I read in college. My uncle was a psychoanalyst and I remember he recommended a book to me when I was going through adolescents, it’s called On Becoming A Person, by Cole Rogers. That book really helped me. So I gave it to both my daughters. And I can’t say that they read it because it’s pretty voluminous, but that book on becoming a person just taught me to be who you are. And you know, everybody’s not the same. You have certain idiosyncrasies and be proud of who you are.
Jonathan V.: What advice would you give to other fathers? Either fathers in general or fathers of children that are interested in pursuing a career in the performing arts or as a comic specifically.
E.J. Glaser: I would say just, number one, get a DVR so you can record shows that your kids could watch when they shouldn’t be sleeping late at night. Because late-night TV is where you’ll find a lot of that.
Get them involved with extracurriculars as thoroughly as middle school and high school, and make sure if that’s something they want to do, that you support them and attend their performances and cheer them on and laugh heartily at their jokes, and get some thick skin because they’ll probably make jokes about you. I’ve had a lot of my friends go to Nicki’s shows and afterward they tap me on the shoulder and say “Sorry. That must be so rough.” So, have thick skin if they want to pursue comedy. Or in the arts.
Lessons, voice lessons, public speaking lessons, anything you can do to augment their school experience would be good.
Hug your kids as much as you can, and just really give them as much love as you can, because as, as they all say it goes, it goes real fast and it goes by in a whirlwind. There comes a time when they’re going to be teenagers when they’re not going to want you to hug them, they won’t let you in. Then that’ll go back again in their twenties.
Now that I have grandkids, it’s just so much fun to put a kid on your lap and read a story and get that special time together. It just reminds me of when the kids were young, how much fun that was. Just relish in it while you can, because it’s a blast being a father.
Jonathan V.: It sure is. EJ, hank you so much for your time. You’ve been extraordinarily generous with it, and I’ve really enjoyed talking with you. You’re obviously an excellent father.
E.J. Glaser: Thanks, I appreciate that. I’d like to think I was, you know, but you always have to have doubts. Thanks. And, I really appreciate the chance to talk on your podcast.